Coming home

Hello everyone...

First, I want everyone know, that I'm okay. I'm sorry I couldn't contact people sooner. For those of you who don't know, the names at the top are soldiers who were killed here in what has been the most serious attack against coalition forces in Mosul for sometime. Apparently, there has been a lot of media coverage of this incident back home. Thank you all for all for your concern and emails of support.

I know, again, it has been a long time, but our operation tempo has been crazy up here, especially because we were training the unit. Things with the new unit have gone well and they are by themselves now; they are doing well from what I'm hearing.

Now for the fun part. Waiting.... Waiting... Waiting...
Since I have been in Mosul, we have not had any sandstorms up here. Sure, it got dusty here and there, but this is Iraq. The day before we were SUPPOSED to fly out, we had a decent sandstorm that kept us from taking our platoon pictures (who cares). Now, we were supposed to fly out already and have been stuck here because they can't get us a flight due to sandstorms all throughout Iraq...apparently.

I will be home soon though. After a brief stay in Fort Dix, NJ (Northeast winter, here I come), I will be heading home. I cannot wait. A lot of people have asked what I will be doing when I get home. I will definitely be getting a lot of face time with the family and friends, but I also plan on going up to Canada to visit my family up there, and hopefully endure another Christmas '07-like celebration of my return and missed holidays. After a little time of being back, I also plan on paying a visit to the students at Parkway West Middle School to show my sincere appreciation for all of their support during our company's deployment. Besides that, I plan on resting a little bit and spending some time away from people for a little bit to unwind.

I will update everybody once I get in Kuwait if it's possible. If not, I will let everyone know, probably by phone or email, that I got back into the states okay.

Again, thank you for all of your support. I look forward to seeing you all.

Merry Christmas

I guess I should start off by saying Merry Christmas, or Happy Holidays depending on who I am talking to, or what litigious people are reading my festive blog. :)



I have been lucky enough to have a couple of days off in celebration, which is pretty decent considering my recent schedule. I am glad to say that I can count the number of weeks until I'm back in the states using my hands. I have been counting down the days, even though it makes time go by slower. I'm not doing it because I want to though, I'm doing it because somehow, everyday I wake up I think, "hmmm... only 'x' days left.... [expletive] why do I keep doing that?"

Things have been going fairly slow here recently, attack wise. My unit has been very lucky, knock on wood.

I was able to see comedians John Bowman (check him out), Lewis Black (my favorite comedian), singer Kelly Pickler and Kid Rock here the other day. That was definitely a good break from the norm and definitely made my day (until my vehicle broke down, and the one that I took to replace it broke down... three times... but that's a different story). That day, I also met the Chairman to the Joint Chief of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen. I spoke with him for a few minutes, and he gave me a coin. For those of you who don't know, coins are specialized to the person that gives them out, and in a bar... the one who has the highest ranking coin gets free drinks... so.... I win.

I sincerely wish everybody back home a very merry Christmas and happy holidays. Wish I was there to celebrate, but you all have definitely made being over here much better.

To my family up in Canada, there isn't any Tequila in Iraq, or for that matter... any safe places to pass out, so I'm good!